Thanksgiving is a cultural aberration. Somehow, society’s tenuous grasp on colonial history has been distilled into it being perfectly acceptable to eat way too much food before 3 p.m., fall asleep on the couch and then wake up to eat pie until you feel sick.
For one day, decorum is out the door. There’s a sort of unspoken bonding as families and friends participate in cooperative hedonism. What starts as a pristine, Hallmark movie-appropriate spread quickly unravels into chaos as a roasted bird is torn apart with gravy-stained hands.
For this one meal, it’s deemed acceptable to “catch ‘em all” with side dishes like their Pokémon — with the inevitable result that you’ll fall asleep in the second quarter of the Cowboys game that no one is really watching.
This is the peak of human society, and no one can tell me any different. Take that, Roman Empire.
Every year, I set out to rank every conventional Thanksgiving food I can think of. Are they the same as last year? Probably not. I never check where things ranked the year before. That was last year’s version of me who wrote that, and that guy was crazy.
As always, these rankings are not scientific, but they are correct — no matter how much people tell me my mouth is broken.
1. Stuffing – Stuffing is magical anarchy. It is a food that is entirely ungovernable. From the moment Thanksgiving dinner is served on Thursday until leftovers run out, there are no rulers, no kings. You want to take this bread-casserole and put it on a sandwich? Why not? You want to eat it cold out of the fridge while people call you a weirdo? Go for it. You want to put it on a waffle iron because you saw it in a TikTok? No one can stop you.
As long as I have stuffing, anything is possible. This aluminum tray of thrice-cooked savory carb cake can take me anywhere. It can be a sandwich. It can hang out with gravy. It can be breakfast. Fear not the gluten madness! Join me in the guild of stuffing wizards! We’re stocked up until mid-December!
2. Gravy – There is nothing that gravy can’t fix during Thanksgiving dinner. The turkey is dry? Gravy. You’ve only got mashed potatoes on your end of the table? Gravy. Your aunt made weird stuffing with za’atar and sumac because she saw a Bon Appetit video? Gravy.
Gravy is the panacea for all Thanksgiving woes. I’m going to carry a vial of it with me at all times in case I run into danger. If I get kidnapped, I can use it to grease up my wrists and bust out of my handcuffs.
Safety first: Always remember your emergency gravy.
3. Whipped Cream – Now, you might be saying, “Hold on. Whipped cream isn’t a food. It’s a topping.” Well, you could say the same thing about cranberry sauce, and people still consider that bogfruit jelly a side dish.
The point here is this: When I look at the dessert table, half of what I see if basically a vessel to transport whipped cream directly to my face.
4. Chocolate Creme Pie – I like my plate of chocolate creme pie to be about a 50:50 pie-to-whipped cream ratio by volume. I try to make it a 50:50 ratio by weight. But I usually get the can taken from me before that happens.
5. Pecan Pie – This is one of the great marketing scams of all time. If I showed up and served a “sugar pie,” you’d all call me crazy. But if I put a layer of pecans on top of it, all of a sudden it’s a classic.
6. Pumpkin Pie – Each year I think I get tired of pumpkin spice. But then I get a slice of pumpkin pie and remember pumpkin is awesome.
7. Turkey – I always hear about people’s turkey being dry. Listen, I’m sorry that whoever is cooking your turkey doesn’t do as good a job as my mom. I get it, my mom can’t cook Thanksgiving dinner for everyone. Although, based on how much she makes, it certainly looks like she’s trying.
8. Bread/Dinner Rolls – Sometimes things get dire as you’re waiting for Thanksgiving dinner to be ready. Fortunately, dinner rolls are there for emergency rations to sustain you through the tough times. It could be dozens of minutes until dinner is ready. But you’ll persevere, thanks to bread.
9. Mac & Cheese – There seems to be a sort of cultural divide where some folks don’t think mac & cheese is a Thanksgiving food. This makes zero sense to me. It’s basically the same thing as scalloped potatoes or green bean casserole — but with noodles. Plus, I’ll never understand why anyone has ever had the thought along the lines of, “Man, I wish this mac & cheese wasn’t here.”
10. Apple Pie – Listen, I really like apple pie. It’s great. But I can have it any time. It’s like ice cream in February. It’ll have its time to shine later.
11. Mashed Potatoes – The glue that — sometimes literally — holds the Thanksgiving meal together.
12. All Other Pies/Desserts – There are just too many desserts to list. So if you’re looking for something like “Sweet potato pie,” “brownies” or “carrot cake,” put it here. Heck, put Pop-Tarts and Dunkaroos here for all I care. I’m not the sugar police.
13. Cornbread – Solid, versatile. Cornbread is a team player. It doesn’t demand much attention but adds a little something to everything around it. We could all learn something from cornbread.
14. Green Bean Casserole – Either be mac & cheese or be a vegetable dish. Don’t try and be both!
15. Ham – To me, the best Thanksgiving ham comes hours after the meal has ended and I’m feeling snacky. I’ll sneak in to pick off a little piece to eat. That’s my secret ham.
16. Peas – My favorite thing about peas at Thanksgiving is that they stand out color-wise. You only need a few on your plate to declare, “Yes, hello fellow adults, I too have put vegetables on my plate.”
17. Corn – Like peas, but closer to beige.
18. Brussels Sprouts – Good if roasted correctly. I’m always afraid they’re going to fall off the plate.
19. Squash – I’ve started to really come around on squash. But sometimes it’s hard for it to mesh with the rest of the meal.
20. Carrots – Loses points for not being able to mix into mashed potatoes as well as peas or corn.
21. Salad – I say the same thing every year: Having salad at Thanksgiving dinner is like having a paramedic at a Little League game. You’re not going to use it. But everyone feels a little better knowing that it’s there.
22. Scalloped Potatoes – Potatoes? Great. Cheese? Awesome. Scalloped potatoes? Eh. For whatever reason, these are almost always too hot or too cold.
23. Candied Yams – What a waste of good marshmallows.
24. Cranberry Sauce – This viscous, vermilion vitriol has stained Thanksgiving dinner with its blood-tinged ichor for far too long. Every year, these eldritch orbs of acid spawn from bogs in Massachusetts and somehow it’s a source of pride in the state.
It pains me to know that countless flubber fiends will make a visceral “splorp” sound as they limpidly flop out of Ocean Spray cans in the coming days. Then the whole family will eat Thanksgiving dinner with this gelatinous log of astringent avarice sitting there like it isn’t some alien menace.
Now, does cranberry sauce add some much-needed acidity to what’s a very starch-heavy dinner? Maybe. But it doesn’t have to be so weird about it.
Previous rankings
For comparison’s sake, here are rankings from previous years. If you have criticisms about my rankings — or me arbitrarily changing them from previous years, please send your complaints to mperri@masslive.com.
